


i can feel my death (now your life is free)

by shroudedfuse (orphan_account)



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: I'm so sorry, M/M, it's just, straight up sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-26
Updated: 2016-02-26
Packaged: 2018-05-23 10:14:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6113332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/shroudedfuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>inspired by an otpprompts post.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i can feel my death (now your life is free)

The day after the funeral was rough.

He couldn’t sleep that night, grabbed a beer to calm his spinning head after a few hours of staring at the dark ceiling, tear tracks burning down his face and spilling into his hair. He’d stopped trying to blink them away days ago, which felt hours ago, and made the slow ache in his chest that grew with every tear grow closer and closer to unbearable. The beer only made his head swim, made his throat seize up and choke as he struggled to keep his thumbs from flying over the keys of his phone because he wasn’t going to get an answer from this number ever again.

to: tyler  
i fucking miss you

to: tyler  
please come back

to: tyler  
i cant do this without you

to: tyler  
i fucking love you man

Rough was an understatement. The day after the funeral was hell.

The second day after the funeral was numb. He’d come home from work late, stayed after for hours banging out familiar patterns and challenging beats on his drum, recording them and deleting them in an endless cycle of distraction and suppression. It was all he could do to simply send his arms flying from one drum to the other, foot tapping on the kick pedal with a vengeance as he let the thrumming sound of the beat drown his thoughts until he was pleasantly thoughtless. 

It was nice until he got home and the beat is gone.

The third day stung in every nerve of his body. He felt too much, felt every inch of his skin with a burning intensity, felt his life at his fingertips down to his toes and felt how easily it could disappear. 

Jenna had called that afternoon. “Will you come home for a visit soon?” she’d asked. He could hear how she choked and it made him sick. “I know you’re busy but…”

She’d paused, and he let her. He knew.

“You remind me of him.”

The fourth day was full of unwanted memories that made his skull ache and rendered him completely useless, a pile of limbs in bed. He called in sick that day. 

They were sitting on the roof of Josh’s car the night before. Tomorrow he’d leave for Ohio, and the thought made Josh’s heart sink, but he knew they’d keep in contact and it was enough.

“We’re gonna do this forever, right?”

Josh’s brow furrowed as he looked to his right. “What, music?”

“Yeah.”

He laughed. “What else are we gonna do, huh? We have at least a billion more reunion tours to go on.”

“Yeah,” his friend agreed. Josh felt him shift and lay back against the windshield. “I’ve got so much more to say, you know?”

He knew. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Me too.”

“I just wanna make sure you’re still down to keep doing this.” His friend sighed. “I mean, it’s hard, you know? Being married and loving that part of your life and wanting to start a family and have that, but still wanting to go out into the world and be someone.”

“I can imagine.”

“Jenna’s cool with it, though. I’m a lucky man.”

“Thank god for Jenna.”

They clinked cans of Red Bull and downed them. The next day, on the way to an airport, someone would speed into his friend’s taxi cab and send it rolling off the highway. 

The fifth day, he found it. 

He’d kept a box of all their records over the years, all the albums they’d released with or without their label. It had been hiding in his coat closet since the accident, but it was cold that morning and he needed a jacket. He reached in for a windbreaker, kicking over the box as he struggled to pull it out, and something slid onto the floor at his feet.

Vessel.

At first, he only stared. Stared at the familiar image of their grandfathers. He remembered that photoshoot, how funny it was to look at the sharp difference between the pairs of them. He remembered eating a lot of donuts while they created that record. 

He called in sick again.

He brought the record into his living room and continued to stare blankly, not quite registering that he was holding the first thing they’d really created together, just the two of them. How much of their hearts and souls had they poured into this album? How many screaming crowds had they entertained on an endless tour with their music? 

It should’ve been endless. 

With shaky hands, Josh put the record onto the player and lined up the needle. He stepped back a bit once he powered it up, and with the first note, fell to his knees. He sat there on the floor, staring with wide, unblinking eyes as tears fell freely down his face and dripped off his chin, from one song to the next, never moving or breaking his gaze from the record.

He hadn’t heard that voice in weeks.

_“Why won’t you speak where I happen to be?  
Silent in the trees, standing cowardly.”_

His instinctual reaction to feeling a soft weight on his shoulder was that he was so far gone, so grieved and desperate, he’d turned to hallucinations. But when two voices started to sing, two identical voices, one distinctly more broken than the other but not his own, the idea of imagining things shattered.

_“I can feel your breath, I can feel my death,  
I want to know you, I want to see, I want to say…”_

Josh turned, and locked gazes with Tyler.

“Hey, dude.”

He didn’t breathe.

Tyler looked the same as he had two weeks ago when he’d left his apartment at six in the morning, all fluffy hair and wide doe eyes that were now shining as they scanned over Josh’s face, his shaking body, the tears that had flowed over his face and left brutal red marks on his skin. He was wearing that same black hoodie and skinny jeans, those same slip on Vans, that same weary smile. He was still him.

He tried shaking his head, tried clearing his vision- he must have been seeing things, he _must_ have been. There was no way. But no matter how hard he blinked, his best friend was still there, crouched next to him, now joining him in his tears.

“It’s me,” he whispered, voice cracking. “I swear.”

Josh swallowed hard, and covered Tyler’s faded hand with his own shaking one. He felt cold, but familiar. It was his skin. It was him.

“Tyler,” he croaked out, but it was all he could manage before he felt his chest cave in completely before he snapped and choked out a sob. 

Tyler collected him into his freezing arms immediately, pulled Josh into his lap and rubbed his back soothingly as he cried. He let him cry for what felt like hours, let him sob into his shoulder until Josh couldn’t physically breathe and ended up gasping and hiccupping in his arms.

“How?” was all Josh could say. 

“Because it was my dream to haunt my best friend when I was dead,” Tyler joked dryly. Neither of them laughed. “I’ve… kinda been watching you. I know you’ve been alone before, but… I couldn’t let you be alone through all this.” His fingers found their way into Josh’s bright red locks and began combing through it absently. “I couldn’t just stand there and watch you suffer, man. You’re my best friend.”

“But you’re…” Josh shook his head, attempting to look Tyler in the eyes, which only brought fresh tears to his own. “You… you… _died_.”

Tyler nodded. “Yeah. And I can’t stay for very long.” He glanced up at the ceiling distantly. “Heaven’s cool. It’s great. But it doesn’t have you.”

Josh rolled his eyes. It struck him just how easily he fell back into the normalcy of being around Tyler when the situation at hand couldn’t be less normal if it tried, and though he tried to remind himself that he’d disappear before he knew it, he couldn’t help but fist his hands into Tyler’s hoodie and breathe in, drinking in the familiarity of it all. Of Tyler.

As the buzzing electricity of Trees faded, a soft piano intro began, and Josh felt cool fingers tip his chin upward, forcing him to look into Tyler’s eyes. “Get up,” he murmured. 

Josh only shrugged, and did as told, stumbling to his feet quickly- he almost forgot how weak he’d become in his grief-stricken state. Tyler hopped up beside him, and held out his arms.

“C’mere.”

He tilted his head to the side in question, but again did as told, shuffling forward into Tyler’s embrace. His arms wrapped instinctively around Tyler’s middle, and when Tyler tucked his head into his neck, he rested his forehead on the top of his head without a second thought.

_“I will fear the night again.”_

Tyler started to sway to the music, and Josh didn’t question it. He listened closely as Tyler sang breathily along, words muffled into his skin, but he knew.

_“I hope I'm not my only friend.”_

He knew what Tyler was doing, but he didn’t care. This was enough for now. This moment, burned into his brain, a real goodbye. 

_“Stay alive, stay alive, for me?”_

Tyler stopped singing. “Will you?” he asked, his voice much smaller now.

Josh ducked his head down into Tyler’s shoulder and let out a soft cry, then sucked in a deep breath, and forced himself to nod. “Yeah,” he whimpered.

_“You will die, but now your life is free.”_

“I love you, Josh. Please don’t forget. Please stay alive for me.”

Josh nodded again. "I love you, too." His eyes fell shut as they swayed around the room, the cold body in his arms slowly drifting until he stood alone, staring at the record player once more, arms wrapped firmly around himself.

_“Take pride in what is sure to die.”_


End file.
